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should I have girded my loins (so to speak) and taken the lane?  Or should I have bailed out earlier?

Bail out when there's a nutter about. The only thing you can do is film the b******s and send in the technically immaculate online complaint to the police.

Yep, that's a tricky bit of road. I try to stay left (even in the so-called bike lane) quite late if it's busy and the light is green as otherwise you do get idiots left hooking you. If the light is red, then I'd get to the front and position myself between the lanes although that does invite poor overtakes (unless there's vehicles parked on the right hand side).

I think ultimately it's down to reading the traffic as you can encounter issues with any road position you may take there.

Don't know the road, so just going off Street View, it looks like an uphill section, so I assume it's slow progress.

I would tend to use the left lane for straight on, I think. I would tend to ignore the magic paint, and ride primary in the left general lane to deter left-hookers.  It's not really a 'cycle lane' there, it's a feeder to the ASL - too short for any other purpose.  If the lights are green and traffic is moving, you don't need to feed, you need to lead.

If the lights are on red, make a decision on approach as to wether you have time to filter to the front and take primary in the left lane.  If not, stay in primary in the line of motor traffic till the lights change and stay in that position till past the junction.

I'm not sure I see a need to be in the right hand lane.  But if I was (e.g. to pull in to the right after the junction), I would definitely ride centrally in that lane.  Beyond the traffic lights, it's a one-way road, so it is perfectly OK to use the right hand lane when slower, but maintain primary to emphasise your position, because drivists are just not used to that rule.

What you certainly don't want to be doing is allowing yourself to be forced to the white line between the general lanes: you'll get drivists going either side of you; and the surface is patchy, waiting to grab your wheel and throw you off (especially in the wet).

Just after the traffic lights, the road goes nicely downhill, but then branches to the left and to the right, so if you want to go right (as Brooksy did and I sometimes do), you need to move over from the left. For me it's a choice between taking the right hand lane early and attempting to out-pace the cars downhill before they can left hook me or it's a case of wait for the cars to go by and then lazily drift over to the right hand lane. As I said, I often base my decision on the traffic light phase.

Sorry, peter, realised you replied to GMB too 

It is uphill, and slow(ish) going, but its usually so busy there that the motor traffic isn't exactly speeding along either (and its a 20mph limit).

The two lanes approach the traffic lights you can see.  Beyond the lights there are still the two lanes - left one goes to go down Jacobs Wells Road and the other continues round the Triangle (where it opens out into three lanes, temporarily) and then up towards Clifton or back all the way round the Triangle.

If you stay in the left lane and try to get across to the right beyond the traffic lights, you are then trying to find a gap in traffic racing (again, ish) away from the traffic lights.

So, I usually take the right hand lane (along with most motor traffic).

That all makes sense - and local knowledge makes the difference.

yes... I'd stay right, then, but definitely keep centre-lane and exude an aura of authority.

Whenever I've ridden that route, I find riding well into the centre of the lane stops them overtaking, but of course, not undertaking.  Like you, I found that if I stay left in the lane, the buggers will try to force their way past, with possibly as much as an inch to spare, which can be entertaining as other drivers speed past an inch from your left elbow.

The cycle lane on the left is particularly useless, especially when the pizza delivery moped gangs park their vehicles in it.

From what I can see, I'd be looking to fully take the right lane at some point (which would depend on a judgement call on the traffic levels as to how late I could leave it and still reasonably expect a suitable gap to move into), and then if i had to manouevre for anything try to manouevre further to the right, so that the worst that can happen is someone swings partially in to the left lane to try to push past, leaving bail-out space to the right.

Once someone starts trying to drive through you, though, discretion the better part and all that - let them go and give them a hard stare.

Haven't been in Bristol for years and that spot doesn't look super friendly.  My general principle is if I'm in the lane already I try to stick it out but not to the point of scaring myself. You've said you were in the right lane and there was traffic in left (so no space), you didn't deliberately let him by but this guy just elbowed through anyway. Nothing you're going to do about him - without being a point-of-principle vehicular cyclist and daring him to run you down. So no issue with you doing whatever to keep as safe as you can.

As for pre-emptive action again it sounds like you did better than I would. To save people beeping, tailgating or undertaking I tend to leave shifting right later than I probably should, so I'd likely have found myself stuck on left and have had to cross at the lights.

This commonplace experience is just the reason that despite the magical incantations of "active travel" and "hierarchy of priority" by our overlords I don't expect a swarm of new cyclists on the roads. It's not even the "I could have died!" moments - though that's enough for most people. It's the feeling that the majority of people in vehicles just see this as "nothing to see, cyclist left a gap and I moved into it, no-one got hurt". If it went wrong I wouldn't have got hurt - in a car. Someone wouldn't have squeezed me out of the lane if I was in a car. F*** it, I'm getting back in my car.

brooksby wrote:

Can I ask for an opinion from the room?

Riding home last night, Queens Road, Clifton, Bristol (between the Pret and the Wills Building, heading west).

https://goo.gl/maps/p3acWaSimR1w9TXY8

I'm in the right hand lane because beyond the traffic lights I want to stay right so as to go around the Triangle and up to Clifton.  So, doing what motorists do ("Getting in the correct lane", I think it's called).

I'm aware of a large van behind me but there's nothing I can do about that - there's no space for it to overtake me, and there's traffic to my left.  It gets closer, clooser, then I think I moved slightly left for a pothole and the driver took the opportunity to push his van's nose up level with me, then further, then further, until I was actually forced off into the left lane.

He drove past me, followed exactly the route I was taking, and turned off straight after the little Waitrose (Bristolians know where I'm talking about).

So, my question: as he tried to basically force me out of the way, should I have girded my loins (so to speak) and taken the lane?  Or should I have bailed out earlier?

You do whatever it is that you can do to feel safe and preserve your well being. Sometimes that's be assertive, sometimes bail, and sometimes that decision changes in the blink of an eye.
The individual was a psycho, and you did the best thing you could do with the information that you had to hand at the time

Can they now tell all the drivers that cyclists don't have to ride in those painted lanes, so they don't get all angry that we're not using the lanes they think they paid for?

brooksby wrote:

Can they now tell all the drivers that cyclists don't have to ride in those painted lanes, so they don't get all angry that we're not using the lanes they think they paid for?

I think they have gone some way to do just that. were I still on twatter I'd be book marking that for future use

I will join in the thanks to Surrey Roads Policing Unit, even though they are no doubt regarded as traitors by the traditional traffic police in Constabularies like Lancashire. Surrey's Twitter account is a goldmine for ammunition to send to Lancashire PCC in my continuing complaint

brooksby wrote:

Fun one on the Metro website today:

https://metro.co.uk/2021/10/14/cheshire-farmer-attacked-cyclist-in-row-o...

Quote:

Prosecutors said (Robert) Fell was driving his van on the rural Chester Road when he was forced to overtake Mr Smith, who is in his 30s, on the outskirts of Knutsford, Cheshire.

The cyclist had chosen to ride his £2,950 bike on the road, ignoring an expensively-built tarmacked bicycle lane which runs alongside it.

Mr Smith shouted ‘you’re too close’ as Fell drove past to which the farmer wound down his window and retorted: ‘Well get on the cycle path then.’

The argument continued when Mr Smith followed Fell to his nearby farm in the tiny hamlet of Millington, the court heard.

The cyclist ignored a ‘Keep Out’ sign and confronted the elderly farmer in his yard, saying: ‘Why are you speaking to me like that?’

Fell told him to ‘get off my lane’ before grabbing a billhook, used to trim tree saplings, and throwing it in his direction.

Makes me wonder what is wrong with that 'expensively built tarmacked bicycle lane', if nobody is using it.

 

Good to see their laser scrutiny cut through to the key relevant points of the case;

'The cyclist had chosen to ride his £2,950 bike on the road' bloody cyclists choosing to do things and buy things....

'ignoring an expensively-built tarmacked bicycle lane' bloody cyclists should know where they belong...

'The cyclist ignored a ‘Keep Out’ sign' bloody cyclists ignoring road signs.....

'confronted the elderly farmer in his yard' poor elderly aggressive driver....

'before grabbing a billhook, used to trim tree saplings' It's not a weapon, it's an honest agricultural tool....

 'throwing it in his direction' not at him, in his direction. How was the humble farmer to know that an honest agricultural tool may cause injury or damage....

Load of billhooks if you ask me....

The final point in the story is that the courts decided the cyclist wasn't due any compensation for the damage to his bike as he was technically trespassing on private property at the time the farmer threw a billhook at him...

brooksby wrote:

The final point in the story is that the courts decided the cyclist wasn't due any compensation for the damage to his bike as he was technically trespassing on private property at the time the farmer threw a billhook at him...

I missed that bit, and wish I hadn't seen it. That had to be spite from the courts. The damage was caused by a malicious and unlawful action from the defendant that could have resulted in injury just as easily. Note the "journalist" labouring the cost of the bike

'claimed £2,195 worth of damage was caused to his expensive bike ' (my emphasis)

All coming as a result of the driver being forced to overtake the cyclist in the first place. I really feel for the farmer, the prosecution clearly know who the victim was in all this.

IanMK wrote:

All coming as a result of the driver being forced to overtake the cyclist in the first place. I really feel for the farmer, the prosecution clearly know who the victim was in all this.

Indeed. Clearly the guilty verdict is a travesty of justice, especially as "The court heard how Fell had had difficulties with cyclists not using the lane near his home since it was built in 2017 as part of a £200m scheme."

Doesn't look too bad from the Streetview, although technically it is a shared use lane so 12-15mph tops from me if I used it. If I wanted to go faster, I would use the road which I assume the cyclist did. The lane does appear to just stop though not far past the junction the farmer / cyclist took. Although I do love the comments of Expensively built cycle lane. The reason the road was narrowed was because the £200million A556 was built in its stead and the Chester Road was no longer needed for the traffic using it, cyclists could have continued as it had it had no pedestrian access along it. 

Stupid of the cyclist to go and confront the farmer on his land though after the incident. 

brooksby wrote:

Makes me wonder what is wrong with that 'expensively built tarmacked bicycle lane', if nobody is using it.

Streetview here

Can't see from the pictures, but is that a shared horse, pedestrian and cycle lane?  Never seen one of those before, if so!

brooksby wrote:

Fun one on the Metro website today:

https://metro.co.uk/2021/10/14/cheshire-farmer-attacked-cyclist-in-row-o...

Quote:

Prosecutors said (Robert) Fell was driving his van on the rural Chester Road when he was forced to overtake Mr Smith, who is in his 30s, on the outskirts of Knutsford, Cheshire.

The cyclist had chosen to ride his £2,950 bike on the road, ignoring an expensively-built tarmacked bicycle lane which runs alongside it.

Mr Smith shouted ‘you’re too close’ as Fell drove past to which the farmer wound down his window and retorted: ‘Well get on the cycle path then.’

The argument continued when Mr Smith followed Fell to his nearby farm in the tiny hamlet of Millington, the court heard.

The cyclist ignored a ‘Keep Out’ sign and confronted the elderly farmer in his yard, saying: ‘Why are you speaking to me like that?’

Fell told him to ‘get off my lane’ before grabbing a billhook, used to trim tree saplings, and throwing it in his direction.

Makes me wonder what is wrong with that 'expensively built tarmacked bicycle lane', if nobody is using it.

For one thing, judging by the pictures on the story, it's covered in leaf litter. And for another, it has to give way at side roads. Oh, and it's not a 'bicycle lane' - it's a path shared with pedestrians (and horse riders).

What it makes me wonder, though, is who exactly was forcing Mr Fell to overtake, and why haven't they been brought to justice for their threats and intimidation.

[/quote]

Makes me wonder what is wrong with that 'expensively built tarmacked bicycle lane', if nobody is using it.

[/quote]

Apart from the fact that it's covered in slippy leaves and they want you to give way every time you come to a side road.

IanMK wrote:

Apart from the fact that it's covered in slippy leaves and they want you to give way every time you come to a side road.

Isn't that the default for most shared use paths away from city centres, though?

brooksby wrote:

IanMK wrote:

Apart from the fact that it's covered in slippy leaves and they want you to give way every time you come to a side road.

Isn't that the default for most shared use paths away from city centres, though?

yes

A lot of lazy reporting there.

Quote:

The road, which connects Altrincham to Chester, was narrowed to accommodate cyclists riding along the so-called ‘Tatton Trail.’

The road has not been narrowed at all.  The carriageway has been narrowed.

Why was he forced to overtake?